Rebels and Causes
by wordslinger
Summary: The only light in her bedroom is the moon. Its silver glow paints the floor and edge of her bed. All she can think about are a pair of violently purple shoes and mismatched eyes. She spent the evening learning how to lean on his arm. Maybe he could teach her how to let go. Todomomo. Quirkless AU.


_**Note: I sat down to write one thing and bloop! Here's something else haha! Guess this is the story that wanted to be told. Maybe one more chapter? This is a quirkless AU.**_

 _ ***Content warnings for eating disorders and [somewhat canon] child abuse.**_

* * *

Momo Yaoyorozu has been raised to appreciate perfection. She runs her fingers over the pleats of her uniform skirt every morning just to feel the layers of perfectly pressed fabric. She adjusts the fold of her uniform shirt collar with a harsh eye – anything less than a flawless lapel would be sent back to the laundry with extreme prejudice. Her knee-high socks are the _perfect_ height and fit. The heels never ride up past her ankles or anything even remotely so unsightly. She always ties her hair back into a stylish but utilitarian ponytail and brushes the length of it into a high gloss. _Perfect._

The boy across from her is messy. It _bothers_ her. His hair, in all its two-toned glory, is just this side of disheveled. His shirt is wrinkled and _untucked._ Momo is pretty sure he isn't even wearing a belt – which is a violation of the dress code. She watches him with a practiced eye – her _mother's_ eye. The one that still makes her wish she is invisible even though she is nearly eighteen and strong enough to stand on her own.

He sighs and tugs at the collar of his shirt. Momo's mouth twists when he pushes the button through the hole and leaves his shirt collar hanging open. His skin is a color she can't quite identify. He is neither pale nor olive. Shouto Todoroki is somewhere in between. She fixates on the delicate dip of his skin between his collarbones.

"Yaomomo," he says suddenly. She startles and is frustrated by the blush she knows is spreading across her cheeks and over her nose.

"You can't call me that," Momo whispers at him haughtily.

"You're staring."

"Excuse me?" She is thrown off by his neglect of her rebuke.

"You're _staring,"_ he says, dropping his eyes back down to his book. "Why?"

Momo huffs in indignation and embarrassment. She tries to smooth her ruffled thoughts. She channels her mother. "Your shirt is wrinkled. I don't know how you can stand it."

Shouto Todoroki shrugs. He _shrugs!_ "I don't care."

"How can you just… _not care?"_ she hisses, leaning forward over her own work.

"I just don't." He glances up at her suddenly and grins. It's a rakish, careless thing. "Every time I don't tuck my shirt or wear sneakers instead of the regulation slides, my dad gets an email about it."

Momo shakes her head. "Then why do you do it?"

"Because it embarrasses him. He can't stop me and he'd _never_ pull me out."

"You'll be punished by the school, then."

He shrugs again. "The worst they can do is keep me after. My dad is _a pillar_ of the _community."_

"So what exactly are you rebelling against?" Momo props her chin on the heel of her palm. She watches him watching his pencil tap, tap, tap against the page of his open book. His lips bow into a frown and for a long moment she thinks he won't say anything at all. Finally he looks up at her and his grin returns.

"Whatever he's got."

* * *

The rain comes without warning and Momo is unprepared. Her shoes leave prints on the entry floor. When she passes the sitting room, her mother raises one flawless eyebrow but says nothing. The silence at dinner is stifling and Momo feels empty despite having eaten everything in front of her.

* * *

The smoke of her mother's cigarette curls from the cherry and she isn't even trying to keep it outside. Momo can smell the tobacco even though the service door was mostly closed until a moment before. Her father is rarely home but when he _is_ home, he can't stand the smell of smoke. She should've known the kitchen wasn't safe. She should've stayed in her room. Instead, she is caught with a plate of dessert cake in her hand.

"You'll get fat," Mikan Yaoyorozu says, reaching back out into the night to flick the ash from the tip of her cigarette.

"I –" Momo cuts herself off and moves to return the slice of cake to the refrigerator.

"Don't." The command is harsh and Momo freezes. Her mother's voice is not much more than a murmur but she can't move. "Sit. Eat your cake."

"I'm not hungry," she whispers. Her hands are shaking.

"Girls who aren't hungry don't sneak down into the kitchen at midnight for cake." Momo can practically hear the paper of Mikan's cigarette burning and crinkling into ash. _"Sit."_

Momo can do nothing but obey. She sits. She holds her fork in her fist and stares at the cake. She hates it. She hates that she caved into a craving. She hates _herself._

"Eat," her mother says.

Momo eats every last crumb and dollop of icing. Mikan says nothing and lights another cigarette.

The cake is flushed down the toilet in Momo's bathroom before she sobs bitter, salty tears into her pillow. Her stomach twists.

* * *

Today his shoes are bright green. They have velcro straps instead of laces. Momo wants to hate them. Beyond the long row of library windows thunder cracks and lightning streaks across the sky. Shouto pokes the eraser of his pencil to the edge of the scar surrounding his eye. His skin twitches a little and she can't help but watch him edge all around it without actually touching the scarred flesh.

"You can ask," he says suddenly.

"It's none of my business," Momo mutters. "I apologize for staring."

"Everybody wants to ask but doesn't." He's watching her and when she glances up she notices his eyes, like his hair, are different colors. "Ask."

Momo scowls. "No."

He leans forward in his seat and Momo shifts in hers. She resents this boy with his wrinkled shirt and bright green sneakers. She resents her _teacher_ for sticking him with her.

"You want to."

"I _don't."_

"Why not?"

"Because I don't care." The bell hasn't rung but Momo gathers her things and stuffs them into her bag. She leaves the boy she hates at the table and is relieved when the bell sounds before she reaches the library door.

* * *

Her mother leaves her cigarette in the crystal ashtray on the window ledge. Momo's room will still smell like smoke but she won't complain about the small effort. She stiffens when Mikan's fingers brush over her skin as she pulls the zipper of her dress upward. When she returns to the window and picks up her cigarette again, Momo turns around.

"When I was your age, my mother bought all my clothes for me." Momo's instinct to wring her hands is difficult to suppress. "She called them gifts." Her mother's eyes shift to the gardens beyond Momo's bedroom window. Soon the lanterns will be lit and her father's guests will fill the pathways and courtyards.

"That's nice," Momo whispers as she reaches absently for her hairbrush – even though her hair is already pinned tightly.

"They were poisonous. The sizes were always wrong. Too small." Mikan leans her shoulder against the edge of the window. Momo stands in silence, her thumb digging into the bristles of her hairbrush.

"Mother –"

"I don't let her buy _you_ anything," Mikan says in a hushed breath. She spears Momo with her eyes and snuffs out the cigarette. "Remember that."

Momo watches her go and tries to not let the hairbrush clack against the glass plate surface of her vanity when she finally puts it down.

* * *

She skirts the kitchens and the tables of refreshments. Too many temptations. Too many sugary, starchy things that will only make her feel twitchy and guilty. The east garden is really too small to have a title but it has always been her favorite. She sees his shoes first. Tonight they are a shocking purple.

"What are you doing here?" Momo asks irritably.

"My dad thinks I'm his protégé." He smirks in that way he always smirks when he's being dry and sarcastic.

"Does he know you wear such offensive footwear to important parties?"

He _laughed._ The sound of it is soft and brushes against her ears gently. She doesn't like that she likes it. "He does. I got a _look_ in the car."

"A look?" Momo raises her hand to flick her hair from her eyes but realizes too late her hair is still slicked and pinned against her head. She touches her ear awkwardly instead.

"Yeah, he gave me the look he always gives me when he wants to write me off but can't." Shouto stuffs his hands in his pockets as if he isn't wearing a sinfully expensive suit and not just… whatever he wears when he isn't in school. She doesn't know.

"I know about your family," Momo blurts. She watches his eyebrow quirk upward – the one on the opposite side of his scar. "You're the youngest. Why can't he write you off?"

"Because the others are…" His eyes dart uncharacteristically around the garden. She's never seen him so unsure before. "Unsuitable."

"My mother uses that word when she's trying to be polite but really wants to sneer at me."

"It's a great word. It conveys both inappropriateness and a polite amount of disdain."

"So you don't like your siblings, then?" She decides she likes throwing questions at him. She likes the way he reacts and the way he talks _to_ her and not _at_ her.

"They're fine. My dad disagrees." His smile fades. "He's a dick."

* * *

At dinner Momo is anxious. She eats a proper amount and keeps her eyes on the very tip of her chopsticks. They are hers but they feel awkward in her hands.

Afterward she slinks away from the crowd and finds the trays of desserts. These are extra and will be thrown out before the night is over. Momo fills her mouth with sweet things and feels an immense satisfaction. She licks the sugar from the tips of her fingers and suddenly the magic is gone. Her stomach turns.

* * *

Momo splashes her face with frigid water. Her mascara is waterproof but her eyeliner is not. The black streaks are irreparable. Her cheeks are pale and her lips barely pink. She peeks out of the washroom and knows if she can just reach the far end of the service hallway she can dash up the stairs and to her bedroom. She carefully closes the bathroom door behind her and spins around.

Shouto Todoroki watches her with an unsettling gaze. She feels naked. Exposed. Her skin flushes and she thinks she might vomit – _again._

"Excuse me," she whispers.

"You never asked me about my face," he says tonelessly.

"What?"

"My mom did it but it's my dad's fault." His eyes prod at her but not in the same way as her mother's. This is different. Momo isn't exactly sure about all the ways Shouto's gaze is different but she doesn't hate it as much as she thinks she should. "He sent her away after she did it. Wherever they put crazy people, I don't know. Fuyumi won't tell me."

"Fuyumi?"

"My sister." His eyes fell from hers and landed on his awful purple shoes. Momo sucked in a breath.

"I eat a lot sometimes," she whispers in a voice she doesn't recognize. His hands bulge in his pockets and she imagines his fingers – the ones that tap his pencil incessantly against the pages of library books – balling into fists. "And then I feel guilty and…" Momo trails off and bites her lip. "My mom has a thing about getting fat. I think it's my grandma's fault."

Shouto nods and pushes away from the wall. He offers her his arm. "Walk with me. You'll feel better if you breathe a little."

Momo hesitates before reaching out and digging her fingers into the arm of his suit. The fabric is soft but the arm beneath it is solid. She imagines her grip is tight enough to bother him but he says nothing.

* * *

The only light in her bedroom is the moon. Its silver glow paints the floor and edge of her bed. All she can think about are a pair of violently purple shoes and mismatched eyes. She spent the evening learning how to lean on his arm. Maybe he could teach her how to let go.


End file.
